Category Archives: Heaven

One Year Ago: A photo speaks.

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A picture is, indeed, worth a thousand words. I’ve been drawn back to the photographs from the days when Nate was sick, and the one I’ve posted here has disturbed me greatly. I’ve been tempted to delete it. But after a loved one has died and additional pictures are impossible, deleting in not easy.

Today I studied this frame for a long time, trying to define what disturbs me so. What would a stranger say about it? Would it be equally upsetting to someone who didn’t know us?

Two of the thousand words it would speak to anybody are, “Deathly ill.”

It also shows that this crisis is unfolding in a home where others are healthy, which might be what is so unsettling. Placing healthy so close to terminally ill might be the classic definition of life-is-unfair.

All of us come into life with a definition of fair and unfair, and we bristle at the picture of one person being singled out of many to suffer intensely. There were 13 of us living together at the time this photo was taken, and I don’t recall who had the camera. I only saw the picture for the first time many weeks after Nate had died. But I do remember that as the photo was being taken, I felt warmth and joy in holding onto a vibrant one year old, especially so because a life-and-death war was raging right behind me. So several more of the thousand words this picture could speak would be, “Death is taking, but life is still giving.”

Nate’s face is turned slightly toward Skylar and me. Although none of us saw him move voluntarily during these last days, and although he was sleeping deeply, no matter how we moved him, bathed him or adjusted his pillow, when we looked again, he was turned toward my “station” at the head of his bed.

So I choose to hear the picture say, “Nate is aware of you nearby and comforted by that.” I also hear, “The wait is almost over,” which applies most importantly to his.

There’s something else the photograph says. Because three of us are in the picture, it means ten family members are busy elsewhere. Although Nate didn’t beat his disease, cancer didn’t take the rest of us down, too, which is a credit to the Lord. The devil is all about disease and death, but Jesus always has the final say.

This picture was taken two days before Nate slipped away from the bondage of pain-ridden illness and entered a hale-and-hearty freedom the likes of which no photograph can describe. Although Skylar and I have continued to enjoy earthly health, Nate blew past us, achieving fitness and well-being beyond our understanding. And because of that, there’s one more word the picture says:

TRIUMPH!

“You have delivered me from all my troubles, and my eyes have looked in triumph on my foes.” (Psalm 54:7)

Marking a Grave

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During the year since Nate died, I’ve visited the cemetery four times. Today we went again, but this time it wasn’t just to stand and think, or even to talk about Nate. Our purpose was to decide on a grave marker. Not to have taken care of this important task in 12 months borders on neglect. The words “unmarked grave” hint that nobody cares, which is the opposite of reality. We care deeply.

Linnea, with 9 month old Micah Nathan, had come north from Florida to be with us this week as we pass Nate’s death date for the first time (November 3). The two of them, plus Nelson and I, drove the 95 miles to Rosehill Cemetery in Chicago and met with a monument representative to discuss the details. But first, the four of us went to Nate’s grave and stood next to the still-fresh-looking strip of sod on the spot where he’s buried.

In the many visits our extended family has made to this set of ten graves in past decades, important words have been spoken, sometimes on balmy spring days and other times into icy winter winds. Small talk and silly chatter have no place in cemeteries, and we’ve found that people either say something valuable or nothing at all. Today was no different.

While Micah crawled among the oak leaves, Nelson, Linnea and I talked about Nate, their “Papa”, and what a dynamic husband and father he was. He worked hard for our benefit and served us rather than himself, 100% of the time. Because of his debilitating back problems and the dreadful cancer coming on top of that, we acknowledged that God’s decision to remove him from this world was a first-rate one…. for Nate. For the rest of us, it was last choice, bringing a set of adjustments we’ll probably never stop making.

As we talked about headstone design, we studied other markers. Letters and numbers carved in stone told sad stories: a 20 year old wife, a two year old child, a new baby. Although our sorrow is great, it’s virtually universal.

Even on our family’s headstone, the marker that’s been there since 1911 and lists seven relatives including my parents, the dates reveal great pain: William, a baby who died of pneumonia at 20 months, and his mother, my grandmother, dying of TB about a year later, leaving three young children. Death touches us all.

Before we left, we all prayed, thanking God, through tears, for Nate and for the Lord’s tenderness toward us. I thought of Memorial Day next spring, when our whole family will return to these graves to honor those who’ve gone before us, including Nate. It was uplifting to think of children in future generations who may continue the tradition, coming to Rosehill to stand at the family plot and study the headstones. We prayed for them, too, that their hearts would turn toward the One who has the keys to life, death and eternity.

We decided Nate’s grave marker will match the Johnson stone already in place, and will have my name on it, too, as an indication that all ten graves are unified in one earthly family.

One day we’ll all be unified as a heavenly family, too, far from the cemetery, alive and well in our heavenly home.

“In keeping with [God’s] promise we are looking forward to a new heaven and a new earth, the home of righteousness.” (1 Peter 3:13)

The Journal: Gratitude and Grace

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While Nate was struggling with his cancer, he often thanked me for helping him. He’d notice every little favor and then voice gratitude: “Thanks for reheating my coffee. Thanks for bringing me my good pen. Thanks for getting the mail.” Frequently he’d go a step farther and add, “You’re a good wife.”

I recall one moment as his physical strength was waning rapidly. I’d assisted with uncapping his toothpaste, getting him dressed and settling him into his lazy-boy. These mini-tasks were not difficult and took only a few minutes. After he was comfortable, I said, “Can I get you anything?”

He grabbed my hand, looked up at me with aching eyes and said, “What does a person do if they don’t have someone like you?”

It was an important moment as he acknowledged his helplessness, a guy who’d always run his life on fast-forward but now couldn’t even pull on his own socks. To be the helper is to demonstrate strength; to be the helped is to accept weakness.

Much of being able to handle serious sickness is coming to a place of need, then willingly accepting it. Nate could have morphed into a grumpy old man but instead became increasingly grateful.

How does an independent person, particularly a man who has been the head of a household and the one to lead, humble himself to be served? In Nate’s case, I believe the only explanation is that he and the Lord had been working together behind the scenes.

After we learned Nate had something wrong with his liver and pancreas, but before we knew it was cancer, I wrote out a prayer for him:

“As a result of the many difficulties Nate’s had and continues to have, I pray he will come to know you, Lord, in ways he never has before. Cause him to see new and spectacular things in your Word. In his feelings of weakness may he not despair but seek comfort from you to carry him through this misery. May he feel deep contentment and peace after placing himself in your care. Please do your heart-and-mind work within all of us to pull us through this health crisis.”

I realize, in looking back, how dramatically God answered those requests. Nate now “knows the Lord in ways he never has before,” because he’s in his very presence! He has “seen new and spectacular things” about God’s Word… because Jesus himself is the Word (John 1:1-2), and Nate is literally in his company! I prayed God would “carry him through this misery,” which he certainly did, bringing him straight into paradise! I asked that Nate feel deep contentment and peace in God’s care, a perfect description of his current heavenly existence. And Nate has been literally “pulled through his health crisis” into physical perfection.

He made a dramatic personal transformation during the six weeks he had cancer. He changed from a nervous, fearful Type A into a mellow, accepting man of tranquility. Because of steadily increasing pain and daily losses, this change goes against all logic, pointing instead to God’s work in Nate’s life.

Just as Nate was thankful for my help back then, today I am thankful for his excellent example and for God’s direct involvement in causing it.

“ ‘Because your heart was tender and you humbled yourself before God when you heard His words…. and because you humbled yourself before Me…. I truly have heard you,’ declares the Lord.” (2 Chronicles 34:27)